Women empowerment has been represented evidently in the Epic of Gilgamesh and the Medea stories. In the Epic of Gilgamesh written by Shin-Leqi Unninni in ancient world, the story revolves around a character named Gilgamesh, the king of a place known as Uruk. The author suggest that Gilgamesh is partly man and majorlygod. The work is about man’s quest for immortality and also the gap between the world of animals, human beings, and gods in which women are highly involved (Coria, 2019). In the story, women have been empowered by the aspect of wisdom and boundary implementation, which reflects how women were valued in Mesopotamia, where the fictitious work is based. Shamhat, Ishtar, and Siduri are women who have been empowered in society, as well as the tavern keeper, whose name is not mentioned. The story epitomizes a long journey toward women’s empowerment in ancient literature.
In the other story Medea, written by Euripides, there is clear empowerment of women who can take definite actions towards challenges in life. The work is based on Medea’s strategic desire for vengeance against her husband, who has infidelity problems. The struggle to have a united family between Medea and her husband grows from the moment they marry, and the two start to battle their differences (Euripides, n.d.). In the story, Medea is empowered in that she has the liberty to plan and execute murder, and there is a text that suggests that she had the power to give drugs to Aegeus, who was impotent (de Villiers, 2020). The major challenge that appears to be limiting women empowerment in the Medea story is oppression from their husbands, where they do not have the freedom to control them by good faith. In the two stories, women are empowered through the aspect of knowledge and power to leverage life issues within their daily interaction with society.
In the story Epic of Gilgamesh, Gilgamesh looks for Siduri while searching for immortality. Siduri knew it was impossible to cross the boundary between man and god and offered him some advice. “You will never find that life for which you are looking. When the gods created man they allotted him death, but life they retained in their own keeping” (Unninni, n.d. p.28). The statement means that society then valued women as a source of completeness in seeking human desires. Siduri was a lady who was critical in her words since she advised the king to fill his belly with what she terms as ‘good things’ and stop fighting with supernatural forces. That kind of liberty to advise the king probes the audience to experience the role of women in the ancient time, and thus, it is true to say they were empowered to take space that a man would fill.
Women are empowered with knowledge about the future and what would be possible. Ninsun and Ishtar are an example of a woman’s capability to assist men in their daily practices since they warned the king that crossing the line separating humanity and gods would bring trouble for him. The other aspect of empowerment with knowledge is seen when Ninsun helps Gilgamesh to translate his dream about axes and meteors (Coria, 2019). Only women are seen tackling the close to impossible when interpreting nature’s fate within the kingdom. There is significant learning and wisdom in the story about women, which indicates that empowerment for the female gender was real through the feminist lifestyle portrayed. Shamhat was given the role of a stand-in goddess, and through her intervention, Gilgamesh is prepared for trials ahead, showing women were highly civilized and empowered.
In Medea, women are not significantly empowered since they face major tribulations with their husbands. Medea was affected by her blind rage towards revenging against her spouse who wanted to marry Glauce, who appeared not barbarian as Medea (Klein, 2019). Thus, women in the text can be said to have lacked significant empowerment as they were taken for granted by their husbands. The audience learn that Medea would be taken to exile by Creon so that she stops from executing her dark plans (Euripides, n.d.). However, the author’s representation of Medea is clear empowerment, although the character trait in Medea is not recommendable for moral uprightness.
Women’s social class was inferior to that of men in Greek society. The females were expected to be frail and submit to their male counterparts and were rarely considered in critical matters (Klein, 2019). The author’s portrayal of women as strong and passionate in their actions is a way of empowering them through the expression of the literary mind throughout the work. The male-dominated society around Medea gives her the power to become vengeful to the extent of killing her sons. Her husband had deserted her, meaning that the male gender at that time did not appreciate the value of women, then showed little empowerment.
First, women are depicted as mediators in the story Epic of Gilgamesh since they give advice to the king and can tell more about the future. Siduri is an example of a woman to imitate in the story due to her boldness in judging matters correctly. As a mediator, she helped the king of Uruk to avoid misfortunes, although Gilgamesh did not consider her advice. Siduri gave the king a treasure of evidence-based wisdom in what is described as becoming a goddess (de Villiers, 2020). However, the incarnation of a destroyer goddess is fearsome as Unninni represents her as dangerous and negative. In the text, the author says that the goddess figure “is the womb and the tomb: the sow that eats her farrow” (Unninni, n.d. p.34). Thus, she unites the ‘good’ and the ‘bad,’ exhibiting the remembered mother, not as personal but as universal. Hence, the two texts so far show that power of women can be emulated, honored and at the same time feared, depending on the context
Second, it is honorable the way women are empowered in the two stories. Medea is a powerful woman who knows how to swiftly execute her moves even though they are disempowering to her husband Jason. The representation is esteemed since it helps enlighten women on making bold decisions to solve their problems (Zaheer & Masroor, 2019). At the same time, Medea instills a fearful character since she is a murderer and vengeful. In the other story, Ishtar had associated with many lovers, all of whom had an adverse end with her. The king, at one point, declined to marry her due to her dark past with lovers. In the context of whether to embrace the power of women, the element of destruction is worrying and, thus, cannot be emulated in the current society. Part of the imitable power is Ishtar and Siduri, who, on many occasions, show an interest in becoming the king’s partners at different times. Ishtar offered to make Gilgamesh wealthy and expand his kingdom if he gave in to her snare of becoming her husband which was expression of interest to empower the king more (Coria, 2019). Therefore, women can be said to have empowered other characters based on Siduri and Ishtar’s perspectives on the king of Uruk.
As depicted in the above texts, women appear as mediators. Siduri operates in that capacity by advising the king about the need to stop competing with gods that had power over him. She connects Gilgamesh and the fate of humanity by telling him how he would avoid wrath from gods. Moreover, Shamhat had the same capacity of connecting Enkidu with human life. The audience can see that Gilgamesh got a new friend, Enkidu, through Shamhat, who helped them stop their antagonism (Coria, 2019). There is a difference between goddesses and mere mortals. Siduri and Medea are mere mortals with the capacity to influence through the power given by gods. Medea was helped by Helios, a goddess that was destructive to human nature (Euripides, n.d.). Despite the mere mortals influencing the goddesses, they could not overpower them without the intervention of other gods. Being couples, Jason and Medea depended on the power of the gods, and the fight they had did not appear to be physical but rather spiritual.
In the Epic of Gilgamesh, divine women’s power helps illustrate how gods control humanity. For example, god Ea had warned the king that there would be a flood in the future. Gilgamesh took the advice and built a giant ship that was useful in storing living creatures and craftsmen (Unninni, n.d.). Immortality would be later granted to Utanapishtim and his wife by god Enlil, and a race of superiority ensued between Gilgamesh and Utanapishtim. The two stories show a culmination of powerful gifts given to women as one way of empowering them. The women in the two stories help readers envisage feminism as a globally embraced factor as far as human beings are concerned.
References
Coria, M. (2019). A comparative study of the vocabulary of vision in Euripides’ Medea and Seneca’s Medea. Journal of Modern Circle, 23(2), 39-55.
de Villiers, G. (2020). Suffering in the Epic of Gilgamesh. Old Testament Essays, 3 (33), 12-14. Web.
Euripides. (n.d.). Medea. Greek Drama Co., Ltd.
Klein, M. (2019). ‘Medea’ rendition highlights ancient stories of women’s oppression and revenge. Daily Bruin. Web.
Unninni, S (n.d.). The epic of Gilgamesh. Schwabe Verlag.
Zaheer, S., & Masroor, F. (2019). Going against the grain: An FPDA of the Epic of Gilgamesh. Global Language Review, 4(2), 34-40.